Root Chakra Healing

The root chakra is a vital energy center, forming part of the energetic system which makes up our ethereal body.

The root chakra regulates many important aspects of our lives, from the flow of life force energy and self esteem, to feelings of safety and security. The root chakra is what connects us to our needs and helps us feel balanced and secure in the physical world.

A blocked or imbalanced root chakra can cause all sorts of havoc and negativity, including anxiety disorders, low self esteem, repressed sexuality and an overall lack of stability.

If your root chakra has become wounded, blocked or imbalanced, embarking on a journey of chakra healing becomes a crucial act of self care and a wise investment in your well being.

The chakra system

The chakra system consists of seven energy centers. These could be considered the organs of the energetic, subtle body. Their function is to maintain and regulate the flow of life force energy, and each chakra has its own specific function and associations.

Most people would agree that maintaining a healthy body and a healthy mind are vital to leading a happy and fulfilled life. But most people overlook the needs of their energetic body entirely, either unaware of its existence or unsure of how to care for it.

Contrary to popular belief, the chakras do not exist only in the mind or as a theory. Modern science can still explain very little about the subtle, energetic body, but its presence is measurable as electromagnetic waves.

However, you don’t need any instruments to sense the presence of your own energetic body or anyone else’s. Even if you are not particularly sensitive to energies, most people are able to sense the presence of another human being in the room. Close up, the chakras themselves feel like vortexes or spinning whirlpools of high-frequency energy.

The chakra system is typically depicted as seven spheres of different colored light arranged in a vertical line.

The crown chakra

This crown is located at the very crown of the skull, is associated with higher consciousness and is responsible for maintaining our connection with the spiritual realm. A blocked or disturbed crown is extremely detrimental and comes to expression in close-mindedness and a disconnection from spirit. Its color is a vibrant violet.

If you lift up your hand, hold it just above the crown of your skull and make a come-hither motion with your fingers, you will physically be able to feel a stirring of the energy as a slight tingling sensation.

The third eye chakra

The third eye chakra is located on your forehead, between and above your physical eyes. The third eye is depicted as having a deep indigo or purple color and is associated with intuition, creativity and foresight.

If the third eye becomes blocked or damaged, this manifests as a lack of clarity, direction or creative ability. As with the crown chakra, you will be able to feel the energy of this chakra if you lift up your hand in front of it.

The throat chakra

The throat chakra is depicted as a deep blue and is located in the middle of the throat, essentially where the physical larynx also resides. This throat is responsible for communication and self-expression.

If blocked, the energy of the throat will wind down and manifest as shyness, withdrawal from social interactions and an inability to speak one’s truth.

The heart chakra

The heart is depicted as bright green and is located in the middle of the chest, in the heart region. It regulates self-love, compassion and empathy, and our relationships and connections with others.

A blocked or damaged heart chakra manifests as a distrust of others, an inability to connect or feel love for others, and even a disregard for self, a lack of self love.

The solar plexus chakra

The solar plexus chakra is depicted as sun yellow and is placed at the sternum, below the heart. It is responsible for willpower, self-esteem, pleasure and responsibility.

If the solar plexus chakra becomes imbalanced it often results in misuse of power, inability to take personal responsibility, anxiety issues and being out of touch with one’s own life energy.

The sacral chakra

The sacral chakra is bright orange and regulates sexuality, intimacy and creativity. It is located just below the navel.

A damaged or imbalanced sacral chakra typically manifest as repressed or withheld sexuality and intimacy, a lack of creativity and spontaneity.

The root chakra

Finally, we have the root chakra (also called the muladhara chakra, which means root in sanskrit). It is located at the base of the spine and is depicted as an orb of vibrant, glowing red energy.

The root chakra is responsible for keeping us grounded and secure in the physical world. An imbalanced or wounded root chakra is expressed as fear and anxiety, as well as mental, emotional and material instability.

Why is the muladhara/root chakra so important?

The root chakra is the very foundation of our wellbeing and stability. Without a healthy and functional root chakra, it becomes very difficult to focus on anything in life beyond survival.

Our higher aims and ambitions, even a sense of self confidence and meaningful relationships with other people all become very difficult to materialise and maintain when you are trapped in the constant fight or flight mode caused by an imbalanced root chakra..

When, on the other hand, the root chakra has a healthy energy flow and is in balance, manifesting abundance, love and fulfilment in your life becomes a breeze. It is easy to build something magnificent in your life if you have a solid foundation to build on top of. Launching an ambitions plan or starting a new relationship while your root chakra is compromised is akin to trying to build a castle on top of quicksand.

Root chakra healing has to come first.

What does a healthy root chakra look like?

If your root chakra is in balance, you will have no doubt.

Sure, we all experience anxiety from time to time, but a wounded root chakra is constant agony.

If your root chakra is stable and whole, you will know from the fact you are not expending all of your energy worrying where the rent is going to come from, or fearing the wrath of an abusive spouse.

Often, when our root chakra is in balance, we tend not to notice it. The root chakra is of vital importance, providing a foundation of security, stability and safety. The root chakra is the discreet backdrop of support for the energies of all of the other chakras.

It is usually only when the root chakra is wounded that we notice its effects.

What happens when your root chakra is unbalanced?

If your root chakra is out of balance, you will know. The major signs of root chakra imbalance are instability and intense anxiety, often bordering on fear.

The fear may be nebulous but it tends to concentrate in areas that have to do with stability and security. You may worry about money issues or even fear for your physical safety. In all cases, a wounded root chakra means that you feel like your most basic needs are not being met, and so you feel permanently threatened, as though you are under constant attack.

Needless to say, this is extremely exhausting and places a serious drain on your force.

Coming from a place of fear, lack and anguish, you may become reckless and impulsive, making decisions that further compromise your wellbeing and stability. It can easily become a vicious cycle – that’s why root chakra healing is so important.

What are the symptoms of a blocked or unbalanced root chakra?

The symptoms of a blocked or wounded root chakra include: Extreme and constant anxiety, bordering on fear. Mental, emotional and material instability.

Often when the root chakra is out of balance, necessary life tasks such as paying rent on time or even feeding yourself can seem challenging.

To someone who has never experienced root chakra imbalance, it may look like someone with a wounded root chakra is dysfunctional or simply unable to ‘pull themselves together.’

However, whether you are the person looking in or the person experiencing the root chakra dysfunction an feeling judged, it is important to remember a few things: Root chakra imbalance is caused by external factors, and although root chakra imbalance negatively impacts personality, it is separate from it. The root chakra imbalance also doesn’t have to be permanent.

What causes a blocked or unbalanced root chakra?

A number of factors can contribute to damaging, disturbing or draining the energy of any of the seven chakras. Negative events may impact different chakras differently.

Here, of course, we will be looking at the root chakra specifically. The first step towards root chakra healing is to understand what has caused or causes the imbalance. Removing the cause is often half of the cure.

Poverty and lack

Experiencing poverty or material lack is one of the primary causes for root chakra imbalance.

If you come from a family where your parents struggled to put food on the table or keep a roof over your head, and if your primary caregivers expressed lots of doubt and fear in regards to money, these experiences became embedded deep in your mind and likely affected your root chakra development.

Even if your childhood wasn’t financially poor but your parents constantly expressed fear and insecurity about money, you may have internalised their negative affirmations and come to doubt that you would ever be able to support yourself.

Violence, trauma and abuse

A damaged root chakra can often be the direct result of traumatic experiences or circumstances. Even if your current situation is safe and nurturing, trauma from earlier parts of your life may still haunt you and continually undermine your trust in the world.

If you have experienced neglect or abuse in your childhood, in a relationship or a work place, this can greatly affect the root chakra. Physical or emotional betrayal or abuse can leave you with feelings of mistrust in yourself and others.

You may have come to expect not having your needs met or respected by those around you. You may even have come to think that this is normal, rather than seeing it for what is, a chakra wound.

Illness and loss

Experiencing a serious threat to your physical health can be extremely damaging to the root chakra as it compromises your safety and causes major distress.

Going through a health crisis or losing someone we are close to is a grim reminder of the fragility of our lives. Losing a loved one or having a near brush with death ourselves is likely to be a destabilising experience.

Longterm stress

A high level of sustained, longterm stress brings the root chakra out of balance.

Experiencing abuse, trauma or lack at any point in your personal timeline may have put a chink in your root chakra, and longterm stress may be the catalyst for your root chakra haemorrhaging vital life energy.

Stress can come from all kinds of different sources, from money issues, safety worries, health concerns and more.

How do I unblock my root chakra?

Root chakra healing and unblocking is largely a matter of chakra balancing.

A healthy diet, good sleep, moving your physical vessel and a safe and and secure environment are the simple foundations not only for leading balanced lives, but for root chakra healing.

Environment

A safe environment is all- important when healing the root chakra. Your home life should fulfil at least your basic need for safety and a reasonable level of comfort.

If you find that any elements – usually people – in your home environment continually compromise your mental, emotional or physical safety, you need to put enough distance between you to allow yourself to heal.

On top of this, cultivate your relationships with family and friends who give you the support and the sense of connection that we all crave as human beings.

Nutrition

Working on your health is a shortcut working on your energy. Keeping this in mind, you may want to change up your diet while you focus on healing your base.

Introduce more fresh, healthy foods into your diet. Good fats from nuts and avocadoes help you feel grounded.

Dehydration often fuels anxiety, so make sure you drink plenty of water.

Yoga and physical exercise

Moving and connecting with your body is extremely important in any healing process.

Yoga is a suitably slow and gentle form of physical exercise, making it the ideal choice when it comes to healing our base chakra.

When you want to bring healing energies to a particular area of your energetic body, it makes good sense to reach the area by going through its physical counterpart.

In this case, you want to find yoga exercises that focus on the pelvic floor and bottom vertebrae at the base of the spine.

Meditation

Root chakra meditation can be done with or without any bells or whistles. You might want to put on some relaxing music and burn incense while focusing on your breath and directing energy to your pelvic floor at the base of the spine. Open your root chakra while in the meditative state and visualise the energy spinning and glowing.

Each chakra has a simple chant associated with it – for the root, the chant is ‘LAM.’ To amplify the effects of your meditation, try including the chant.

Incense and essential oil

Burning incense or essential oils is a wonderful way of creating an environment that promotes healing. Burning incense or essential oils is a great addition to your meditation or yoga practice.

Incense and essential oils that help rebalance the root chakra include sandalwood, myrrh, benzoin, vetiver, patchouli and my personal favourite, frankincense.

Crystals

Crystals that stimulate the root chakra include garnet, bloodstone, red or brown jasper, smoky quartz, cuprite and hematite.

Grounding

The root chakra is associated wit the earth element, and so connecting with the earth. Spending time in nature or even just in your garden helps you reconnect with the root and fosters an inner sense of stability.

If temperatures and circumstances permit, take off your shoes and place your bare feet on the earth, the grass or the sand. At the very least, place your palms on the earth and feel its stabilising presence.

What does it feel like when your root chakra opens?

When a closed chakra finally opens, there is a physical sensation to it. You will feel a vast rush of energy flowing through the area of your ethereal body that has just become unblocked. Like a metaphysical drain plug being pulled.

How long does it take to open the root chakra?

Since everyone’s starting point is different, it is impossible to give any guarantees as to how long it takes to open any chakras that have been closed up for any period of time.

Patience and consistency are key to root chakra healing

The important thing is to focus on your own growth, your own healing, your own journey. Don’t worry too much about anyone else’s.

Chakra healing = one of the most powerful forms of self care

Opening and healing closed-down or damaged chakras is a mind-opening, life-altering act of self care.

Not only will the process of rebalancing your root result in its healing, you will also learn much about yourself on the way.

How to keep the chakra energy system healthy and balanced

Keeping your chakras balanced and healthy is simple compared to healing them in the first place.

Life is full of events that we cannot predict or control, such as falling for a partner who turns out to be abusive, causing damage to several of our chakras.

But there are also many aspects that we can control and work on – there are many things we can do to strengthen and support not only or physical bodies, but our ethereal bodies as well.

Establishing a solid self care practice and becoming fully conscious of your needs is your strongest path going forward.